Good or Bad? (Part 1)

Back in February, I wrote about an article that appeared in Foreign Policy Magazine. The article [PDF] was a debate about Cuba and Fidel Castro, matching Carlos Alberto Montaner versus Ignacio Ramonet.

Ignacio Ramonet writes for Le Monde diplomatique, a monthly news magazine that covers international affairs, and Carlos Alberto Montaner is a world-syndicated columnist that covers international issues, with a focus on the Latin region.

In my February post, I wrote how this debate was "a stalemate between opposing views, reflecting how in general there are little attempts to bridge the political gap." I also mentioned how the opposing sides provided "no convincing argument" in my opinion. (Babalu blog obviously saw it very differently.) Looking at the article again, I see Ramonet's argument MORE convincing than Montaner's.

One main disagreement I have with Montaner (among others) is his description of how "[n]o one is more anxious to abandon egalitarian collectivism than the legion of engineers, doctors, technicians, and teachers forced to live without the slightest hope of betterment." Egalitarian collectivism? According to past polls and other sources about the attitudes of Cubans, there are many indications that the majority of Cubans still favor revolutionary principles (such as equality over freedom), especially the universal educational and health institutions that are highly criticized in Miami, especially by hard-liners. Montaner's confident belief that educated Cubans are "anxious to abandon" a construct that is viewed very favorably in Cuba, seems to be based more on desire than fact. On the other hand, Ramonet presents a more realistic view of what past research indicates.

Anyway, the big question that Foreign Policy Magazine asked in February (Was Fidel Castro Good for Cuba?) was a question incorporated in an international poll conducted by the Pew Global Attitudes Project.

In their report, released last July (full PDF report), concerning various attitudes in the developing world, the Pew Global Attitudes Project found time to incorporate two questions concerning Cuba and Fidel Castro while doing surveys in South America. The results come from surveys of about 800, over-18-year old adults each from Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, Chile, Mexico, Peru, and Venezuela.

[Part 2]

On Separation

The tales of young siblings being separated by the state are tragic. I myself have an older brother, and cannot imagine a world without him. That's why many, like Alan Mishael, argue that siblings have rights to be together (a "fundamental right to family integrity"), and shouldn't be easily separated. And I agree totally. But, the issue is complicated.

When Carol Marbin Miller reported about Alan Mishael and his fight to keep the siblings together, she also reported about DCF's past record in keeping siblings together through adoption. It wasn't a rosy picture.

"A 2001 audit found that, statewide, siblings in state care who were eligible for adoption were in the same home 67 percent of the time; in Miami-Dade the success rate was 43 percent... And a soon-to-be released report from the University of Chicago found that siblings in foster care often do not live together in the same home, and visitation among brothers and sisters 'is occurring infrequently' in Miami-Dade and Monroe, and 'not occurring regularly' in Broward. The report says brothers and sisters don't get opportunities to talk on the phone or communicate in other ways."

Articles describing the problem of separation cite various obstacles: lists of potential families that only want one child, families that don't have the resources to take in more than one child, or a sibling with special needs. No doubt, there are many other obstacles, but according to Lillian Johnson, welfare department director of 10 years, it's mainly due to the list of potential families.

"[T]he likelihood of finding a family that will take more than two children is so limited... Sometimes all [welfare departments] have are families that only want one child."

Additionally, according to a great 2000 Salon article by Nell Burnstein, "[t]he [national] number of children in foster care has ballooned to more than 500,000 while the number of foster home beds has shrunk. And new federal legislation -- the Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997 (ASFA) -- has created pressure (and financial incentives) to get children into permanent homes as quickly as possible."

According to a 2005 Miami-Dade County report [PDF], the number of children in foster care has decreased from 5,911 in 2003 to 4,822 in 2005. Yet, a Miami Herald article last month (by Carol Marbin Miller) revealed that foster care is currently suffering from "serious flaws."

Through this tragedy of foster care, all measures should be taken to keep siblings together when they loose their parents, BEFORE one of them gets adopted (looking at you Joe Cubas). The benefits of keeping those bonds can have long-term positive impacts. Thus, there are means to preserving those bonds if they are eventually broken.

Maintaining the bonds of separated siblings can be done by simply arranging regular phone calls, letters or e-mail exchanges, or regular personal visits. Brian Samuels, former director of the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services believes that "[i]n most cases, maintaining sibling contact is essential to the growth and development of these children."

About Fathers [and Siblings] (Part 3)

I've mentioned before about one of the controversial arguments that have been presented in the Cuban child custody case, but recently another has been posed.

Last Wednesday (August 29), Joe Cubas [in picture], current custodian of the 4-year old Cuban girl in dispute, appeared on the Jim DeFede radio show to present his side of the story. He mentioned his early efforts in trying to contact the legal father of the girl in Cuba, and how he respected the father's right as a parent. BUT, he also mentioned his respect for the rights of the girl's 13-year old half-brother [MP3]:

"First of all, I've said that I believe these children deserve to be together. And the reason I say that is because the same rights that Mr. Izquierdo has as a father are the same rights that her brother has as a brother."

"This is not only a sibling, this is also a parentified sibling. This has been the one person that has been constant in this child's life... who from the moment of her birth has acted not only as her older brother, but to a certain degree as her father."

The issues that Cubas raises about parentified siblings and the separation of siblings are very important (and have been discussed thoroughly), but I have never heard of the rights of parentified siblings being viewed as "the same" as a legal parent's until recently.

The phenomenon of parentification, where a child assumes a parental role when a legal parent (for various reasons) cannot, does seem to apply to the Cuban child custody case: the 13-year old brother very likely had to assume a larger role in the single-parent family after they arrived in the US, and may have thus achieved a very profound bond with her younger 4-year old sister, especially after the mental breakdown of the mother and the subsequent intervention by the state. But, how these facts lead to a legal claim to the younger sister, on par with the legal rights of the father, is beyond me. Though, attorney Alan Mishael does try to explain.

Alan Mishael, part of the legal team representing the Joe Cubas Family and the 13-year old half-brother, last month told the Miami Herald that ''[c]hildren have a constitutional right to remain with their siblings, unless the state presents a compelling reason for splitting them up." Mishael is referring to the 14th Amendment that specifically forbids laws denying "life, liberty or property" without due process. It's the same amendment that protects a parent's right to their children, unless they are determined to be unfit. But, I think Mishael is really stretching it thin because this particular argument for sibling rights has been defeated in the past, and very likely does not apply in this case.

Mishael's concern is understandable. He's on the board of directors of Florida's Children First, an organization that does very noble work representing childrens' concerns in the care of the state. His professional history is admirable and deserving of many other awards, but does he really want to go on a "collision course" with the rights of the father and brother? Whose interest does this really serve?

In the literature (and articles) concerning the separation of siblings (or parentified siblings), many strongly argue that actions should be taken very early to keep siblings together (during and after state care), especially if the bonds are strong. In the Cuban custody case, while the siblings do not have the same father, their separation could have been prevented if the state had denied any adoption until the parents of BOTH children had given up parental custody. But, instead (as if in a hurry), DCF carelessly gave custody rights to the Cubas Family knowing well that there was a father in Cuba.

It's a bit too convenient for Joe Cubas or DCF to now say that they want the siblings together, when it was they that caused the initial separation of the two. Arguments about the rights of siblings (or parentified siblings) should've been made when the children were still in state care, before the half-brother was adopted by Joe Cubas. According to Ira Kurzban, lawyer for the legal father (Rafael Izquierdo), "the [half-brother] no longer has the same legal rights, under Florida law, as other siblings. State law... terminates the bonds between siblings when one or more of them are adopted." There are similar laws in other states when siblings are separated through adoption.

Those who are making this case more complicated, are stretching the legal limits.

About Fathers (Part 2)

Gordon E. Finley astutely points out one factor that may be influencing motivations in the Cuban child custody case. A recent and unrelated case involving the Florida Department of Children and Families (DCF) may provide some insight into another factor.

Late last month, a mother and father finally got a court victory after their children, ages 2 and 5, were wrongly taken away by DCF last year. According Jon Burstein of the Sun-Sentinel, a Broward county judge found "state [DCF] was negligent in failing to properly investigate two children's medical histories before accusing their mother of intentionally making them sick", despite the fact that "[t]he children had detailed medical records from California, where the family had lived, and the family's doctors gave sworn statements rejecting the abuse allegations."

The DCF abuse allegations in court (based on the theory of Munchausen syndrome by proxy) dragged on for 6 months! The children ended up in shelter care for at least 77 days where they were not allowed to see their parents. Now, with a victory over DCF, the parents, Donald and Sara Evans, plan to sue three DCF officials in federal court for taking away their children. According to one of the Evans' lawyers, "[t]he family now lives in a constant state of paranoia, fearing they could be separated at any time."

The motivations by DCF in the Evans case are puzzling. One advocate (Lary Holland) believes that DCF (like other state departments of human services) are motivated by federal grants to separate families. This argument follows that "a relationship exists between the federal funding of state welfare programs and the determinations made by state family court judges presiding over child-custody and domestic relations matters." Specifically, federal grants under Title IV of the Social Security Act operates as the "external economic factors that... drive judicial discretion and influence professional judgment in domestic relations matters" in state cases. Holland's personal experience, being declared an "absent parent" by the state of Michigan, has made him lose full custody of his two children. He is now an advocate for equal custody rights for parents, part of a growing movement in the United States for separated families.

If DCF is found to be negligent in the Cuban child custody case, aside from the trauma already produced by the case, there may very well be lawsuits ahead, with additional personal impacts on BOTH families in the dispute. This reality must be weighed by DCF (and most likely it is) before it continues to drag the case any further with its controversial arguments. Still, the Evans Family case presents a foreboding scenario.

[Photo by Lary Holland]

About Fathers (Part 1)

Yesterday, the Miami Herald published letters regarding the controversial Cuban child custody case. Its a mixed bag of opinions from the Herald's readership, but I noticed one letter that provided some interesting insight.

The letter comes from Gordon E. Finley. Some readers might recognize the name because Gordon E. Finley is also the name of a respected psychologist who has worked extensively on the subject of relationships between father and child, and has a Ph.D. from Harvard and now teaches at FIU.

It is very likely that the letter published yesterday comes from Dr. Finley, and he raised an interesting point: "The reality is that were the gender of the two parents in this international custody dispute reversed, the Cuban mother would have been on a plane to Havana with her daughter within hours of the girl's circumstances coming to light."

He may be a little too confident in his remark, but I believe that our stereotypes of gender has been a crucial factor in this case, as was in the Elian Gonzalez case. Dr. Finley's beliefs come from his extensive research in divorce cases, where he notes that the court system "awards either sole custody or primary residential parental responsibility to the mother around 85 percent to 90 percent of the time." Finley also points out that a father's loss of child custody can have severe effects on the father's life, such as "substantially higher [compared to divorced mothers who lose custody] rates of: suicide, depression, alcohol abuse, drug abuse, poor health, work problems, relationship problems, and social isolation." These facts may point out our social bias towards always supporting the "nurturing mother" in custody cases.

Finley, without question, is a strong advocate for equal gender/parental rights, and rightly points out gender bias on other issues, but he's most concerned about what he calls "the silent epidemic of the demise of fathers from the lives of our children." According to Finley's own research based on children of divorce, interviews showed that these individuals (looking back) felt they had lost "intangible assets" after divorce, such as "the 'being there' assets of affection, emotional connection, and companionship with their fathers."

While I disagree with Finley's general assumptions about what lies behind our gender stereotypes, I think his findings are important points to consider in the Cuban child custody case. The weak allegations being made against the Cuban father, Rafael Izquierdo, by the Florida Department of Children and Families may be based on these negative biases that society generally has on fathers in custody disputes. There is still no evidence indicating that Izquierdo is an unfit father.

This fact may explain why DCF and lawyers for Joe Cubas have so far provided radical arguments in court to deny Izquierdo custody of his 4-year old daughter.

Important Details

Casey Woods' recent article in the Miami Herald forgets some important details in my opinion.

Woods writes about Magda Montiel Davis, one the lawyers working pro bono for a Cuban father trying to regain custody of his 4-year old daughter. The case has become quite a controversy here in Miami where Cuba related issues are generally viewed through a microscope, and analyzed with a dichotomous assumption of good (the United States) vs evil (the Cuban government). Woods mentions Davis' 1994 visit to Cuba where she was documented giving Fidel Castro a kiss and calling him a "great teacher." Since then, Davis is a convenient target for condemnation by Miami hard-liners, and an example of courage for the Cuban government.

Obviously, some of the most condemning remarks have come from callers on Radio Mambi, many of whom consider Magda Montiel Davis an agent for the Cuban government. Casey Woods mentions in her article that "some callers [on Radio Mambi] blasted Davis, calling her a liar. One man gave out her office phone number on air. [Ninoska Perez] Castellón urged listeners to call the Florida Bar Association and demand an investigation."

Woods accurately summarizes what generally happened that day, I was also listening to the same program, but there are some important facts that she leaves out.

Woods is specifically referring to Ninoska Pérez Castellón's 3pm show called "Ninoska en Mambi", which aired this past Friday. That day, once callers were allowed to participate, Davis was not only "blasted" as Woods describes, but also insulted and excoriated. Woods doesn't mention that Davis was called much worse things than just a liar.

Furthermore, the man who gave out Davis' office number on the air was in fact ALLOWED to do so by Pérez Castellón. I remember this very clearly. The caller first ASKS Pérez Castellón if he can give the number out because he had it with him at the moment. Pérez Castellón seemed reluctant, but had no problem telling him that he could. Woods is correct to mention that Pérez Castellón was urging her listeners to instead call the Florida Bar Association, but Woods failed to mention that Pérez Castellón APPROVED of giving Davis' office number on the air.

And, what's most troubling is the fact that the caller who gave out the number made his intentions clear to Ninoska Pérez Castellón beforehand. He said that Radio Mambi listeners should call Magda Montiel Davis' office "para molestarla" (to bother her). After giving out the number, the caller added that people shouldn't call to insult or threaten Davis.

Too bad Radio Mambi can't guarantee that.

A Very Misinformed De la Cova

I just read the latest fulminations at Babalu blog, and noticed that occasional commenter Antonio De la Cova (Indiana University assistant professor) posted a very misinformed comment.

In a controversial post concerning a recent Pat Oliphant cartoon, which I will try to address soon (especially Henry Gomez's apparent racism), Antonio De la Cova (who has before identified himself as commenter "delacova") adds a comment referring to Senator Robert Byrd.

Mr. De la Cova writes:

"Senator Robert Byrd, Democrat from West Virginia, joined the Ku Klux Klan in 1942, and was the Exalted Cyclops leader of his local chapter. While speaking on race relations before the U.S. Senate on March 4, 2001, Byrd was heard on C-Span saying: 'There are white niggers. I've seen a lot of white niggers in my time.' He didn't specify if he saw them in the KKK."

I don't know about the "Exalted Cyclops" part (Byrd has already publicly regretted his membership with the KKK), but Mr. De la Cova makes THREE factual errors in ONE sentence. How odd coming from a Ph.D. in history. His only correct statement seems to be the quote by Senator Robert Byrd.

1) Senator Byrd DID NOT speak about race relations "before the U.S Senate." Byrd spoke about race relations on Fox News Sunday, interviewed by Tony Snow.

2) Senator Byrd DID NOT speak about race relations on March 4, 2001. The nationally broadcast interview was taped on Friday, March 2, 2001.

3) Senator Byrd WAS NOT "heard on C-Span." He was heard by a national audience on the Fox News Channel. The interview can be viewed on YouTube, at your leisure.

This is very surprising (and disappointing) coming from a Ph.D.. I wonder what else Mr. De la Cova has misinformed readers about at Babalu blog? (Not that they aren't already misinformed about a lot of other things.)